June 2007 MMA News Archive - Page 5

Do you have a hot MMA story or news item that you have found and would like to share?
Then read our guidelines then post it to our MMA News Share Forum to have it display here for the community to read on this page.

LAS VEGAS – Excuse Jens Pulver for believing he somehow found himself on the set of Groundhog Day.
Life seems to be replaying itself in an eerie way.
B.J. Penn is the center of the mixed martial arts universe as he prepares to fight Pulver on a UFC card on Saturday at the Palms Hotel & Casino. Accolades are flowing freely in Penn's direction.
Dana White, the UFC's outspoken president, said Penn is the most talented mixed martial artist in history. Saturday's bout is being pushed as Penn's shot at redemption.
Link.

Rich Franklin, a guest this morning at this morning's UFC-sponsored breakfast at the Associated Press Sports Editor's convention, told reporters that his next fight would be a title shot against the winner of Anderson Silva v. Nathan Marquardt. Franklin went on to say that the fight would take place either in Cincinnati or Denver (the latter, presumably, if Marquardt defeats Silva).
HERE (scroll down)

UFC.com today confirmed that Michael "The Count" Bisping would take on TUF 3 counterpart Matt "The Hammer" Hamill at September's UFC 75 event in London. This puts to rest the rumor that Ken Shamrock will return to the UFC to face Bisping.
HERE

Nick Diaz will not be cornering his younger brother, Nathan Diaz, in what will surely be the biggest fight of Nathan's career. Nick, who is himself under a six month NSAC suspension, has been advised that due to his suspension he will not be able to secure a corner's license in Nevada.
Jake Shields will now travel to Las Vegas to take over cornering duties. He will be joining Gilbert Melendez and Cesar Gracie in Nathan's corner.
-Graciefighter.com

This is up on the Dog. This guy has been THE guy to break Fedor news in the past, personal friends, always interviews him... Take it for what its worth, but he's not usually wrong... He says UFC and Fedor have reached a verbal agreement...
LINK

Mauro was Pride’s play-by-play announcer for several years and has a strong knowledge of how the company did business, as a result. He said there was a six-month period in Pride where fighters were offered bonuses if they lost via ref stoppage from strikes or a submission. The idea behind the bonus wasn’t to get fighters to take dives, but to entice them not to quit in order to make the fights more dramatic. The clause never served its intended purpose and that was it.
LINK

The phone call came out of the blue, but given the way Roger Huerta’s career had taken off in the previous six months, nothing was going to be too surprising. When the UFC called, it was usually another interview, another photo shoot, another media tour. Huerta took the assignments gratefully, knowing that its things like this which make fighters into stars and that help educate people about the still-growing sport of mixed martial arts.
LINK

Gray Maynard thought he was done when it came to competitive athletics. A three-time All-American wrestler for Michigan State, Maynard had fallen short of his dream of making the 2004 Olympic team, and after years of sacrifice, he was tired of the ‘other’ stuff that went along with being a top-flight wrestler, such as weight cutting.
LINK

Oft-injured former middleweight contender Dave Terrell (6-2 MMA, 2-1 UFC) could return to the UFC as soon as this year — and he’d do so as a 205-pounder, according to the official Web site for Gracie Fighting.
LINK

Entering season five of The Ultimate Fighter reality show, most believed that at best, Manvel ‘Manny’ Gamburyan would possibly do enough to warrant an undercard bout on the season finale card, but nothing more. Few but the hardcore fans knew who he was, and at 5 foot 5, they figured that he was just too small to compete against the young guns of the 155-pound weight class.SOURCE

SAN JOSE, Calif., June 20 -- With doubts lingering around Friday's co-promoted Strikeforce-EliteXC pay-per-view card, EliteXC president Gary Shaw cleared the air during a press conference Wednesday.
Link.

Well, Krazy Horse got himself locked up last week, with multiple parole violations. Gary Shaw has been trying to "spring" him, but it's not looking good. There was no bail set, and Charles Bennett is currently locked up. If Shaw can't get him on a plane by 10:30 am tomorrow for the weigh-ins then the fight is off, with Edson Berto pencilled in to replace the Horse. I personally was looking forward to seeing Joe Boxer vs Krazy Horse, it would've been a war, maybe in the future.
SOURCES: SHERDOG.COM................MMANEWS.COM

UFC welterweight champion Matt Serra (8-4 MMA, 6-4 UFC) will make his first-ever title defense against former champ Matt Hughes (41-5 MMA, 15-3 UFC) at a November pay-per-view event in New Jersey — not at The Ultimate Fighter 6 Finale.
LINK

"For Shamrock, a win over someone like Baroni, not considered top 10 at MW, but certainly someone that is a game fighter, would go a long way towards reestablishing his reputation. It wouldn’t fully cement Shamrock as top of the food-chain, but it would answer a lot of the remaining questions."
HERE

This Friday in San Jose, former UFC middleweight champ and MMA legend Frank Shamrock takes on Phil Baroni in a fight that has been building up for close to a year now. The two fighters square off for the vacant Strikeforce middleweight belt (in an event co-promoted by EliteXC), but a shot at the title seems to be the least interesting aspect of the fight.
HERE